Recently I got into an interesting conversation with fellow sports fans here in Malaysia regarding the development of a fan affiliation with a particular franchise team. Sometimes the matter is one of geography. You live in a particular area, there's one team in that area, so naturally you are inclined to support that team and wish for its success as it reflects positively on where you reside.
Other times you find that the affiliation for a team follows a pattern of family history. Your grandfather was a whomever fan, your father was a whomever fan, so naturally it is assumed (and family pressured) that you too will be a whomever fan.
Then there is the advent of multinational television and Internet services that remove the geographic affiliations. Now it's perfectly valid for someone in the tri-state area to be a fan of the Dallas Cowboys or Los Angeles Lakers or Real Madrid in the World Cup.
The whole subject came up when we revisited the idea of baseball or softball to the locals here in West Malaysia. They were taking a gander at my autographed baseballs and photographs, then saw all of the New York Mets-related old yearbooks and other memorabilia but couldn't understand why as a Mets fan I would possess items more closely associated with teams other than the New York Mets.
I tried to explain more in terms of football (soccer to us Americans) that while you are the dedicated fan of a particular team and root for its success, that doesn't mean if an opportunity arose for you to meet one of the all-time greats who happened to play for one of your team's competitors you likely wouldn't turn it down.
After coming to some understanding we went once again for a renewed attempt to generate a game of 18 or more players swinging bats, catching balls, running the bases, and striking batters out. There was initially a whole lot of nothing when I asked routine questions like, "Who bought the equipment? Who has set up a schedule? Who has found an open field we could retrofit as a baseball diamond?"
Simon & Garfunkel's "The Sounds of Silence" sprang to mind as this group that had been so enthusiastic about getting started, stalemated on activity, then regenerated interest seemed to suggest they wanted it to happen after all. Obviously I was a willing and fairly knowledgeable ambassador from the other side of the world willing to bring America's game to Malaysia.
The conversation then evolved into more project management, identifying the tasks, creating a schedule and identifying the human resources participating in coaching, practicing and logistics. They were more impressed with my tools to stay organized and that sidetracked the whole ballgame topic to the point where it appears that it won't be happening after all.
Then I broke out the videos. They weren't ready for things like perfect games nor long home runs as much as they were amused by trick plays, flashy fielding and stolen bases. There I had them held at rapture with the game, but the revised attempt to get them ready to actually play the game fell to pieces.
3 comments:
That Messi guy doesn’t look too messy. All the Malaysians would need is to watch Alonso take batting practice up close.
I think you have an impossible task of teaching the ins and outs of this game to the locals there.
Teaching them that would be almost as difficult as teaching me the ins and outs of American football. 🤣
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